Groaners!
Job interviewer: Where do you see yourself in 5 years?Me: I personally believe my biggest weakness is listening.
I’ve been doing a lot of abstract painting lately, extremely abstract. No brush, no paint, no canvas, I just think about it.
If humans held hands around the equator of the earth, most of them would drown.
Whoever said nothing is impossible never tried slamming a revolving door!
I have a condition that stops me from dieting. I get hungry.
Yesterday I bought a sweet car online.Previously owned by Neil Diamond.
I’ve started writing a book about hurricanes and tornados.It’s only a draft at the moment.
I was walking past the fridge last night when I thought I heard the onions singing Bee Gees songs.When I opened the door, it was just the chives talking.
I never thought I would be the kind of person who would get up at 5:00am and exercise.And I was right.
Dog wins!
Today is the birthday, in 1948 of Dan Seals – the younger brother of Jim Seals of ‘Seals and Croft’. Dan had a remarkable music career in his own right. Before moving to country music where he had a number of hits, he was known as ‘English Dan’ and, with John Ford Coley, had this soft rock hit.
February 8, 1591 was the birthday of Giovanni Francesco Barbieri better know as Guercino. He was born into a family of peasant farmers in Cento a small town in the Po Valley. His nickname, Guercino, refers to the fact that he was cross-eyed being a diminutive of the Italian word for ‘squinter’.
His early works were naturalistic somewhat in the style of Carravagio. He spent three years in Rome at the invitation of Pope Gregory XV and stayed there until Gregory’s death in 1623 when Guercino returned to Bologna. He set up his studio there, took on pupils and was incredibly prolific. His later works are more classical and embody much more luminosity and clarity than his early works thanks partly to his use of chiaroscuro.
We can see this in his two paintings of ‘Susanna and the Elders’, the biblical tale set in Babylon when two old men conspire to seduce and blackmail a young woman to have sex with them.
Here is his first painting of the subject, painted in 1617. It is very dynamic.
Contrast it with this later version painted in 1650 by the same artist. It shows much more contrast between light and dark and appears more luminous.
It’s also interesting to contrast both of these paintings with one on the same subject by Artemisia Gentileschi – one of the very few female artists of the time. Her painting of the subject has, to me, a particular female point of view; the postures of the men are threatening and lascivious and the woman seems clearly oppressed. It’s an interesting contrast in perspectives. This was her very first signed painting.
Guercino died in 1666 leaving a large number of works and many pupils who became well-know painters in their own right.
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